Rajeev Kumar Garg v. BSES Rajdhani Power Limited

1. By this writ petition, the petitioner prays for quashing of the departmental proceedings issued against the petitioner pursuant to the chargesheet dated 10.1.2013. The sum and substance of the charges against the petitioner is that the petitioner demanded a bribe for deferring the orders of disconnection of supply to the premises of one Ms. Kickey Sandhu.

2. Three grounds have been urged on behalf of the petitioner before me. First is the lack of authority in the disciplinary authority to 2013:DHC:1520 conduct the disciplinary proceedings. The second is with respect to the enquiry officer not having the necessary authority and the third is of delay in issuing of chargesheet in the year 2013 with respect to an incident of September, 2009.

3. The petitioner, as imputation of charges shows, was caught red handed in his car, however, he sped away. I may note that the petitioner was chargesheeted earlier also for another misdemeanour, and with respect to which he had filed W.P.(C) No.5330/2011. This writ petition was dismissed by a learned Single Judge of this Court (S. Muralidhar, J.) vide order dated 28.7.2011. This order reads as under:- “1. Mr. B.R. Sharma, learned counsel appearing for the Petitioner submits that he is not pressing the relief in regard to the order dated 23rd May 2011 suspending the Petitioner since by a subsequent order dated 22nd June 2011, the suspension was revoked. However, he assails the issuing of the chargesheet to the Petitioner by an authority who according to the Petitioner is not competent to issue such chargesheet. He is also aggrieved by the fact that the chargesheet pertains to an event which is more than two years old. According to him, the proceedings have been initiated malafide.

2. In the considered view of this Court, all the grounds raised by the Petitioner in the present petition can be raised by him at the appropriate stage, if at the end of the inquiry he is found guilty and awarded punishment. At this stage, this Court is not inclined to interfere.

3. The writ petition and the pending application are dismissed.” (underlining added)

4. I have time and again put to the counsel for the petitioner as to what are the rules of the respondent organization, and which as of today is a private organization, as to who can be appointed a disciplinary authority and an enquiry officer. The rules with respect to who would be the disciplinary authority and the enquiry officer would be the rules as prevalent at the time of unbundling of DVB and of which unbundled DVB the respondent entity is one DISCOM.

5. Learned counsel for the petitioner in response to the queries of the Court wants to refer circulars issued by the Government much after the unbundling of DVB in the year 2002 and therefore those circulars cannot apply. What will apply would be the circulars as on the date of unbundling inasmuch as the service conditions were not to be changed adverse to the employee such as the petitioner on the date of unbundling. The respondent in fact has categorically stated in its letter dated 5.3.2013 that the disciplinary authority for an Assistant Engineer/Senior Engineer is the General Manager (HR). Nothing to the contrary is pointed out to me by the counsel for the petitioner, however, counsel for the petitioner urges that the petitioner is not an Assistant Engineer but a Senior Manager in the respondent-organization. In this regard, a reading of the writ petition shows that petitioner claims that he was designated as a Senior Manager, however, there is nothing filed on record to show that the post of a Senior Manager has a different scale of pay or is a higher post than the post of Assistant Engineer to which the petitioner was in fact promoted in the year 2006. Similarly, on the issue of who can be a disciplinary authority, counsel for the petitioner argues with respect to not giving more than a particular number of active cases to an enquiry officer in terms of a circular issued by the Government of India in the year 2012, however, no circular is filed at the time of unbundling of DVB as to what were the rules as then applicable. Government of India may keep on modifying its rules subsequent to unbundling of DVB, however, it will not mean that automatically the amendments to the rules or issuing of circulars by the Union of India subsequent to the unbundling will also automatically apply to employees of a private organization such as the respondent.

6. So far as the issue of delay is concerned, it is not a ground for scuttling the enquiry proceedings. Enquiry proceedings are stayed only when there is lack of jurisdiction or some other issue which goes to the root of holding of the enquiry. Grounds such as the ground of delay are not such grounds which would go to the root of holding of the enquiry in a case such as the present.

7. In view of the above, there is no merit in the petition which is accordingly dismissed, leaving the parties to bear their own costs.

VALMIKI J. MEHTA, J MARCH 20, 2013 Ne